EDNA F. LUNNEY
English Teacher 1962 - 1978

Although a traditionalist and a disciplinarian, Edna Lunney was at the same time an educator before her time. Her expectations were high for every student, and long before anyone was talking about cooperative learning, she had built into the curriculum a series of seminars in which students regularly met in small groups to discuss, in a markedly scholarly fashion, formal critical analyses. She designed a true Humanities curriculum, in which she interwove English with music, art and history. Her students left her classes knowing how to think and how to write; they also had moved considerably closer to what the world would expect of them as human beings.

Edna was a perceptive and courageous voice among the faculty, and when she spoke, people listened. She single-handedly began the theater program at Mount Greylock, directing, most years, not one but four productions: a traditional three-act play in the fall, a musical and a full-length faculty play in the winter, and at least a one-act play in the spring.

Being around Edna, no matter what one’s age, just seemed to make people do their best.